Criminal institutions

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After the Wannsee protocol was discovered in 1947, it still took decades before the involvement of the German society in organizing and committing the crimes was fully comprehended. In particular, the Protocol revealed the role of the government administration and agencies in this process. The panels in the five sections offer examples of the levels of different participation in the crimes, usually committed in cooperation with each other.

The institutions represented by the participants at the meeting in Wannsee have been brought together in the categories ‘SS and Police’, ‘Administration of Occupied Territories’, ‘Ministries’ and ‘Party’. In addition, institutions not represented at the meeting in Wannsee were also integrated into the organisation of the mass murder and willingly played their part. The Reichsbahn – the railway system – is just one example. An agreement was reached with the Reichsbahn on special travel rates for trains carrying especially large numbers of people. Private enterprise companies also worked hand in hand with the state institutions. For instance, in the Litzmannstadt ghetto, in today’s Łódź, private textile producers such as Neckermann or Leineweber used the deported people as a workforce.

You can find other examples in the right-hand section entitled ‘Other participants’.